


Normalcy is Relative

by hedgehobbit



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Erwin is Armin's sort-of dad, F/F, F/M, M/M, Mythology - Freeform, Other, Supernatural Elements, also first two chapters have some blood and injuries, but this fic isn't centric to one ship, erwin/levi are kinda a bg pairing, it's a monster college au, maybe more ships later depending on how this trainwreck goes, they're all various monsters
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-06-11
Updated: 2014-10-23
Packaged: 2018-02-04 06:57:13
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 6
Words: 14,073
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1769851
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hedgehobbit/pseuds/hedgehobbit
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It's a bunch of monsters being nerds. Next to nothing dramatic happens. </p><p>Eren sucks at being a werewolf, and Armin finds himself helping this clueless guy into not killing himself accidentally every full moon. Reiner discovers the woes of being an incubus in college; Bert has just transferred and even as a half-angel he's having trouble finding his classes. Ymir has an amazing girlfriend with just some bad faerie habits, while Krista has to keep her demon partner in line most of the time. Jean's still a shithead, but he's a shapeshifter-which makes it that much worse. Marco talks to plants more than he talks to his professors, which is great for him being a nymph, but not so great for his GPA. Connie sadly has no outright supernatural abilities as a kobalos but he can make some killer Greek food. Sasha's perfectly okay with this, it means she wins all their prank wars since she's so well-versed in witchcraft. Mikasa has her hands full with a job, busy class schedule, and a brother who can't rightfully keep himself out of trouble, but there's an ice spirit in her class that for some reason helps her forget all that.</p><p>alternately named "I couldn't think of a title that wasn't lame"</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Armin finds a Stray

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Armin's night walk gets interrupted because he comes across a man stuck in a barbed wire fence, but hey at least he's cute

Armin loved going for walks at night. It was calming, and helped him clear his mind. He liked being alone every once in a while, and he was sure nothing could sneak up on him and if that happened he could handle his own.

He could hear the river directly to his right, and figured he was probably a few miles from his father’s house at this point. After dinner (or breakfast, however you looked at it) he’d decided to leave to clear his head. His fourth master’s degree was being really difficult-the work load was so much, he barely had time to sleep during the day.

He knew the woods around here well, he’d lived around them for the past twenty-something years. He remembered when they hadn’t built the shopping center twenty miles from the opposite river bank, and when the property about eight acres to the east hadn’t been bought by the dumbass who insisted on having a barbed wire fence around his property. Armin found his feet taking him in that direction anyway, knowing the path was less worn down and his pants would probably be snagged numerous times by briars and sticklers.

Still, the moon was big and lit his way well enough to jump over most overgrown spots in the path. He tried to think of a thesis statement for his paper, which was due in a week, then let his mind wander to other things, like trying to remember the exact formula for an ice potion. He’d never been good at making those.

He walked closer to the river, the trees thinning a bit so the moon shone on his skin. He looked over the water, hearing someone cat-calling and seeing a freshwater mermaid half out of the water, waving her webbed fingers at him. He smiled and waved back, and she dove back underwater. The mermaids in this river had always been a bit forward with their affections for him, after it was established holding him underwater for three hours wasn’t going to kill him. He tried not to let the attempted homicide part bother him.

He walked along the river, politely declining three skinny dipping offers before he turned back into the forest. He breathed in deeply, being able to smell the trees, the decaying leaves, the river water, and…Armin breathed in deeply again, and was certain he smelled blood. He walked toward the scent, confused more than anything when it smelled like human, predominantly. A little bit like an animal-had somebody been attacked by a bear or something? He walked quicker, barely noticing he was getting close to their technically neighbor’s property until he hit the barbed wire fence. He started to walk along it, sure the blood was coming from along the boundary somewhere.

It wasn’t long until he saw someone literally wrapped in the barbed fencing, blood shining on their body. He breathed in, and suddenly it snapped together that the blood was no doubt werewolf. He hadn’t been around one of those in a long time. Armin picked up his pace, getting close enough to examine just what had happened.

The man had really gotten himself in a situation, for sure. The fence barely came up to Armin’s chest, but it was specially made. Their neighbor was a bit paranoid and old fashioned when it came to werewolves and fairies, something to do with a mutilated wife and a stolen child, so he’d gone to great lengths to curate a barbed wire fence infused with silver and iron-had cost a fortune, and Armin had always assumed a werewolf would be smart enough to jump over the fence if they wanted in that badly.

Well, apparently not, because here was this one. Armin leaned down, slightly curious as to how he’d gotten so wrapped up in it. A few posts on either side were jerked out of the ground, only giving more of the wire to get tangled in. Which is exactly what this guy had done, it seemed.

Armin leaned down, touching the man’s shoulder lightly. Unconscious he’d reverted back to a man, and wasn’t wrapped as tightly as Armin assumed he had been in wolf form. Still wasn’t exactly easy to get him out of, and Armin cut open his hand on the fencing. God, Nile would come to Erwin’s door with holy water if he knew his kid was doing this.

The man wasn’t heavy for Armin, but the walk back was still a pain. He walked along the bank of the river to bypass a lot of the obstacles in the thick of the forest, but had to deal with mermaids swimming along below him.

“Toss him to us!” one called, “We’ll take care of him!”

Another splashed the water in agreement, “Wolves drown just like everyone else!”

One with a very young-looking round face announced, “I’ve never tasted werewolf before!”

Armin tried to calm them down, insisting it was a friend, and he was not on the immediate menu. He hoped Erwin was still home, he was so much better at medical care than Armin was. And Armin wasn’t well-versed in wolf care, either.

His clothes were ruined by the time he made it to the back door of his dad’s home. He left a big red smear on the glass, which he knew Levi would kill him for.

“Erwin!” he called as he shut the door heavily behind him, adjusting the man in his arms, “Levi! I-I, uh, found someone who needs help! Badly!”

He walked into the dining room, which lead into the living room. The luxurious spaces were empty, and no one was answering his calls. Looking out the front window, he saw the driveway was missing a Cadillac, and huffed in frustration. He looked down at the man in his arms, seeing his features clearly for the first time.

His mouth was bloody-knowing wolves, he’d probably tried to bite through the wire and succeeded only in hurting himself more. His skin was dark, at least compared to Armin’s paleness. Latino, probably. His face was smeared with blood around his mouth and neck, and his dark hair was matted. Armin sighed, knowing the couch was off-limits (vintage from France, thank you very much) and the dining table was a definite no-go. He was sure there was a cot up stairs, but he couldn’t carry the man and the cot, they were too bulky. He sighed, and walked back into the back entry room, grimacing as he set the man down on the floor. He turned, vaguely worried he might wake up and then Armin would come down to an empty, bloody room and that’d be freaky. But with those wounds, inflicted from silver? No way he was waking up.

It took too long to find the cot and it was a hassle working it down the stairs. At least this furniture was replaceable, and didn’t cost an arm and a leg (figuratively). He propped it up in the entry room, nearly completely blocking the way inside. He lifted the man back up and laid him on the thin mattress. Armin looked at the blood pooled on the floor, unable to stop himself from imagining Levi’s general reaction to the unholy mess he had made.

He wiped his hands on his clothes, fishing his phone out from his pocket. He dialed Erwin’s cell, running to the bathroom closet and pulling out a big first aid kit. He was back by the man’s side when he heard a voice answer.

“Erwin, where are you?” Armin said, squinting at bottles of antiseptic.

“We went out,” Erwin said, “Are you in trouble, you sound sort of…panicked.”

Armin looked at the unconscious _werewolf stranger_ in his dad’s house, bleeding all over their floor, “Uh, no. But I probably will be. I, uh, picked up a stray.”

Erwin breathed out, “Oh, god. Why do I know it’s not a lost puppy?”

Armin let out a nervous laugh, trying to use a cloth to wipe off the blood everywhere, “It kind of is, dad, sort of? I don’t know if he’s lost or not.”

“Armin.”

“Okay, okay, I was walking, and I found a werewolf stuck in Nile’s barbed wire, and I brought him home, and he’s bleeding all over your Malaccan Cherry floor, but he’s really hurt and I don’t know I want to help him,” Armin belted off.

There was a long silence on the other line before he heard a very unnecessarily long sigh, “He got caught in Nile’s fence?”

“Yeah.”

“I was sure only someone completely asinine as a wolf could get caught in that,” Erwin murmured, “Well, you’re going to need to clean him up, at least. Are the gashes deep?”

“Uh,” Armin lifted an arm, “Depends.”

“Focus on cleaning him up,” Erwin said, “I’m turning around. The last thing we need is a dead werewolf in our house-we’ll go tomorrow, Levi. Well, we’ll go the next-“

Armin dropped his phone on the table, and started to swipe over all the blood everywhere. This was going to take a long time.

~-~-~-~

Erwin wiped his hands on the apron he was wearing, breathing in deeply, “Well, that completely wasted my night.”

Armin pushed some bangs that’d gotten loose back, “it wasn’t wasted, I mean, he’s patched up and probably not going to die.”

Erwin looked down at Armin like he could care less, blue eyes cold. He breathed in again, “Now what do you plan to do with him? Do you know how unpredictable these things can be when they wake up? I’d rather not have some pissed wolfboy tromping through my house.”

“I wasn’t going to keep him here. There’s still another hour or two before the sun comes up, I think I could get him in the city, put him somewhere that someone is guaranteed to find him.”

Erwin looked outside, “Well. I guess. You’ll need to put some clothes on him, though.”

“Well, I knew that, dad, jeez,” Armin said, and Erwin planted a hand on his head, ruffling his hair and ruining the half ponytail he’d had up.

“Was Levi mad?” Armin asked.

Erwin shrugged, “Not nearly as mad as he was when he saw the blood everywhere. You managed to get it on the curtains in the front. He was not amused.”

“You can buy more,” Armin pointed out, “I’m going to go find something that might fit this guy.”

Armin walked away, taking his time and doing it at a normal pace. Levi was lounged on the couch, sunk in the plush white cushions. It kind of made him look smaller, but Armin didn’t say so. He didn’t look at all in the mood for size jokes.

“Are you good now, Armin?” he asked, obviously irritated, “No more random fuckers in the house bleeding out, right? The good Samaritan in you is sated?”

Levi was probably the only human not afraid to sass a vampire very much older than he was.

Armin smiled good-naturedly anyway, “Yeah, sorry for interrupting date night.”

Levi’s lips twitched, but he just looked away. When Armin came back from his room, the man was asleep.

Erwin was in the kitchen, swirling around a glass filled with blood that had kid-like fish designs on the outside. Armin had no idea why they still had that glass, but Erwin seemed to always end up using it, no matter how ridiculous it looked.

“Thank you, Erwin,” Armin called as he walked past. He heard a slight grunt in reply.

Armin dressed the man, whose name and identity was still a complete mystery. Erwin had had to use stitches in some places, and Armin mentally told the man he was lucky his dad had been a doctor for forty years, before he moved to law.

He looked kind of silly, because the sweat pants were too small and came half way up his bandaged calves. He was cleaned up, though, and kind of cute sleeping. His expression was sort of angry, and he was snoring lightly-more of a growl, really.

Armin wrote out a note, and slipped it in the pocket of his old sweat pants.

“I’ll guess I’ll go before it gets any later,” Armin called. He looked at his phone, it was nearly four a.m.

“Are you going home or coming back here?” Erwin asked.

Armin shrugged, even though Erwin couldn’t see him, “I’ll go to my house. If that’s okay, if you want me to come back and clean up, I will.”

“No, I’ll get it,” Erwin said, walking into the room, “It won’t be up to Levi’s standards either way, so you might as well go home and sleep before your classes. Go on, then, and take your stray mutt with you. I don’t want fur on my furniture.”

“He’s not even in wolf form,” Armin muttered, sliding his hands under the man’s neck and knees as he picked him up, “I’ll be back for a meal sometime this week. Thanks again, though.”

Erwin opened the door for him, putting a hand on his upper back as he walked by, “You’re welcome, I suppose. Call me, if anything at all happens. And please, try not to do this again.”

Armin nodded as he stepped onto the deck, “Alright, alright, dad. Good morning, talk to you tonight, probably.”

“Good morning to you, too, stay safe,” Armin rolled his eyes as he heard the door shut, but only because he was positive his dad couldn’t see. He opened the door of his Audi once he was off the deck, carefully placing the werewolf in the passenger seat. After a second thought he put on the seatbelt for him, and then went around to the driver’s side.

It was a quiet ride, as he didn’t really feel like listening to music. He drove into the city, which was still pretty active at night, and thought about where to drop this guy off at. He felt sort of bad, but without any form of identification, he’d had no way to know where he lived. Plus he’d done enough for him to warrant no guilt as he decided the subway would be as good a place as any.

The train station wasn’t empty, there were actually a good amount of people waiting for a ride. Luckily, they’d all probably seen weirder as Armin deposited the werewolf on the nearest bench and left without doing anything else. He felt at least a little bad until he got above ground again and realized the sky was getting lighter. It’d be a shame to get caught without any proper protection from the sun, so he quickly drove to his own home.

It wasn’t as big as Erwin’s, but certainly wasn’t small. Tucked away on his own plot of land, he didn’t have to deal with nosy neighbors or close quarters to others. Armin liked that. As he shuffled through the halls and down the stairs, he felt the night’s events really weigh on him. He yawned as he pushed open the door at the bottom of the steps, going into his bedroom smartly located underground.

He rubbed his eyes a bit, not bothering to change into pajamas after he took off the soiled clothes he’d been wearing. Tonight when he woke up, he’d be rather upset with himself for getting the sheets dirty but he really didn’t care. He was asleep not even a moment after his head hit the pillow.


	2. The Stray finds Armin

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Eren finds out, once again, he's fucked himself up while being a wolf during the full moon, except it's a little different this time.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> loop doop thanks for the kudos :') idk how often this will update but it probably will be sporadic

When Eren woke up, everything hurt.

He rapidly blinked his eyes, trying to shield them from the lights overhead while at the same time attempting to block out the insufferable noise all around him. His head was pounding, when he moved even the slightest bit there wasn’t one muscle in his body that didn’t protest.

“Ssssir, I can call an ambulanccce if you’d like,” someone said, and Eren lowered his arm enough to squint at the person leaning slightly over him. She had thin black hair, and equally black scales were in patches beside her eyes and on her neck under her ears. Her eyes were solid yellow with a slit pupil.

Eren made an incoherent noise, as when he opened his mouth to speak, he felt the slashes at the corners of his lips for the first time. God, last night had been the worst change he’d ever _had_. What had even happened to him?

He struggled to sit up, the reptilian lady trying to offer help but unsure whether to touch him or not. He reached a hand up to his forehead, and cleared his incredibly dry throat. His voice was rough and unlike his own when he said, “Can you call my sister?”

It took a while, but the woman stayed with him until Mikasa got there. He was in a subway station. He’d never been in one of those in his life, and suddenly he wakes up in one. He was endlessly confused, and still very much disoriented. The lady-whose name was Kakoa, Eren picked up-asked him questions about what year it was and where he lived, but he hardly had the consciousness to answer. He felt like absolute _shit_.

Mikasa was a sight for very sore eyes when she pushed her way towards the bench. She issued a brisk thank you to Kakoa, and had to sling Eren’s arm over her shoulder since his legs hurt too much to walk on his own. Once she picked him up, though, he let out a loud yelp as the position tugged on some injury on his chest. The walk to Mikasa’s old Nissan was long, and Eren felt even worse when he collapsed in the back seat.

Mikasa looked over her shoulder at him worriedly, “Do you need to go to the hospital, Eren?”

“No,” he snapped, “I need to go home.”

He heard her sigh, and turn on the engine. He put his arm back over his eyes, whining slightly with each breath, trying to remember what had happened last night.

Mikasa had dropped him off in the woods. The woods were a good place to change-no crowds to freak out, no property to destroy, no one around to find out he was indeed a werewolf. Mikasa was the only one who knew, because she was the only one he trusted. Maybe being a werewolf wasn’t a bad thing-of course it wasn’t, but he just didn’t know how to handle it. He was the worst werewolf ever, and the bite didn’t come with a guide book.

Or maybe it did. Eren wasn’t bitten. His asshole dad had injected him with werewolf saliva one full moon and hit the fucking road without giving any explanation.

It was all so blurry in his wolf form-a fence? He’d run into a fence. Gotten very angry at that fence. The fence hurt a lot. But if he’d been caught in a fence, then why’d he wake up at a subway station? Why in the hell had a fence hurt him that badly?

He groaned when Mikasa ushered him out of the car and into their small shared apartment. The steps were a nightmare to get up, but going inside the lobby in this condition would be plain suspicious.

He sat down on the well-worn couch, looking himself over. Mikasa helped him take his shirt off, and that’s when Eren’s mind cleared enough to notice something else-he’d been treated for his wounds. Very slowly it seemed his wits were coming back to him, and looking down at his chest he saw a bandage wrapped around his upper torso. The front of his biceps had stitches across them and various other wounds had been taken care of, too.

He looked up at Mikasa, who looked just as perplexed as he was.

He asked for a drink, and while Mikasa was in the kitchen he picked up the shirt he’d taken off and inhaled deeply. It smelled like laundry detergent. He breathed in deeper, but it just smelled like it hadn’t been worn in a while, like it’d been stuffed in a dresser for months. The sweatpants were too small on him, and he stuffed his hands into the pockets, expecting to find nothing when his right hand crumpled something.

He pulled out the piece of paper, and unfolded it, looking at the very neat script across the page.

_Please be more careful-Silver infused fences are very bad for werewolves!_

He stared at the words, very hard. No signature, but when he inhaled deeply he was able to smell the person who’d written it. It smelled nice, and clean. A bit like a hospital. There was a slight sweetness as well, maybe a lotion or cologne. Eren didn’t recognize it right away.

“What are you doing?” Mikasa asked when she offered him the glass of water. He did have a piece of paper pressed to his face, so he understood the slight tone of concern in her voice. He handed her the note in exchange for the glass of water.

“Silver infused fence?” Mikasa read aloud, “You got caught in a silver infused fence, Eren?”

Eren didn’t answer as he gulped down the rest of the water, feeling infinitely better even though he had to be careful with the slashes to the sides of his mouth. He hoped they didn’t scar, he’d look just like the joker.

“So whoever wrote this must’ve found you,” Mikasa said, sitting down lightly on the coffee table, “And helped with your injuries.”

“Must have,” Eren said, reaching back up to rub his temples, “Why did they leave me in a subway?”

“I don’t know,” Mikasa answered, “Why did they help you at all? Why didn’t they at least give us a way to thank them? You don’t think they did anything to hurt you, do you?”

“I don’t know, but I don’t think so,” Eren looked down at himself, “God, I was in bad shape, Mika. I still am, but. Shit, I probably would have died.”

He looked up at his sister, seeing her concerned expression and sighing, “I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be sorry, Eren,” She said, standing, “You should get more rest. Do you want to move to your room?”

He shook his head, moving to lay down on the couch, “I’ll stay here until you get back from campus.”

“There’s no way I’m going to classes with you like this, Eren,” she said, firmly. Eren knew not to argue with that tone, “I’ll go get some blankets. Just-just don’t move.”

Eren felt endlessly guilty. Mikasa was constantly worried about him, had been even before he was a werewolf. That just made it worse. She was concerned about him-the only family they had was each other and Eren always failed to be a good brother and just once not give Mikasa a reason to fret over him. He was such a mess.

He felt a blanket be laid over him, and sighed appreciatively. He was so tired, and confused, and slightly hungry, but he fell asleep before he could even worry about that.

It took three days for him to fully recover, even though his chest still ached and he limped a bit. Mikasa was content enough with his condition to go back to her life, which Eren was glad for. He hated making her miss days because of him, and not once in the past six months had she not stayed home with him after a change.

He went back to the subway station, which probably looked very weird as he sniffed the air and the bench he’d woken up on. Maybe this entire idea he had was stupid, but he had to try. Being a werewolf had heightened his senses-smell, especially-which was what he was relying on here. The person who’d patched him up knew more about being a werewolf than he did. His intentions were to find them, and ask for help. He knew he was in their debt, but he was so tired of making Mikasa worry. He just wanted to learn how to take care of himself.

The person’s smell hadn’t been overpowering, which wasn’t the best for Eren as he was trying to find it again in a very public place. Clean and slightly sweet was rather common, but not the same smell as the note. He walked to the bench from every entrance and exit, multiple times, before sighing and going back up to the street.

He inhaled the air around the entrance, smelling the morning commuters and the hotdog stand a block away. The scent would be four days old by now, so Eren was sure he was wasting his time. Still, he walked around the city, sighing to himself after a particularly long smell. People were staring, but he didn’t know any of them and didn’t care.

After two hours of walking around the city, Eren’s legs were sore again, and his head was foggy with roughly one fuckton of different scents lingering in his brain. He accepted defeat, feeling worse than this morning, kicking himself because that’d been such a stupid plan.

He got back into his car, and decided maybe to try and catch Mikasa on her break between lectures. By the time he was on campus, it was nearly time for class to let out. He didn’t text her, just in case her phone wasn’t on silent. He’d wait until he knew she was out-what was it, again? 2:30?

He got out of his car anyway, sighing and walking to the fountain. A couple of other college students were around, walking briskly past or enjoying the sun. Eren leaned against the stone, not caring his clothes would get wet, and just breathed.

He texted Mikasa that he was waiting by the fountain, and kept a watch for her. When he saw the familiar red scarf, he started to walk towards his sister, who was talking to a shorter blonde woman with long bangs and the rest of her hair in a bun. He was about to call out a hello when he smelled it.

He was sure that it was that smell-less like a hospital this time, but it was the same smell. The same cologne or lotion, very lightly scented like some kind of flower, maybe. The smell might’ve been soap now that Eren smelled it again. He turned around in a circle, forgetting Mikasa, and followed the smell.

His nose could only get him so far, but it got him far enough. He really could not believe the _chances_. Maybe the person was a college-age student, like him. How long had they been a werewolf? He nearly lost the scent once, which had given him a slight moment of panic, but he found it again and soon enough he was sure that a blonde man sitting alone on the grass was the one who’d written the note.

He tried to keep himself from running, but he was awfully excited. This was someone he could really learn from, finally.

The man was sort of small, but Eren couldn’t judge his height well sitting down. His hair was blonde, and just past his shoulders, half of it pinned back even though long bangs hung loose around his handsome face as he read. He was using an umbrella, stuck in the ground like he was at the beach, and wore a dark blue button up over a black band shirt and brown pants. His hands were covered by tan gloves, and large sunglasses rested on the bridge of his nose.

He didn’t look up from his book when Eren sat down heavily near him, close to his things.

“If you wouldn’t mind, there is a lot of other places to sit, not so close to me,” the man said, flipping the page of his textbook and writing something in the notebook on the ground beside him. His voice was soft and smooth, and Eren nearly felt compelled to leave before he remembered why he was here.

Eren realized too late that he hadn’t even thought of anything to say to the guy, which prompted him to blurt out, “I’m sorry to bother you, but did you write this note?” He held out the slightly crumpled piece of paper, with the calligraphy facing up.

The man didn’t move for a second, and Eren felt awkward as he simply held out the piece of paper to a man he’d never met before. What if he wasn’t the person who’d saved him?

When the blonde finally did look up, the surprise was evident on his face. Eren felt his own face heat up for some reason as the other man obviously looked him up and down. He reached up and pushed his glasses up, and Eren was again taken aback by how attractive he was, even with his bangs back. He had big, blue eyes, and not even a sign of under eye circles. That was something you didn’t see on college students often. His features were delicate, but still masculine with soft looking lips…

Eren still hadn’t said anything, and probably actually blushed when he caught himself staring. _Now’s not the time, Jaegar_ , he reminded himself, clearing his throat and pulling his arm back to straighten the note out nervously, “I’m sorry I just sat down, but, uh, I’ve been looking for the person who wrote this note and uh-“

“Yes,” the man said, “I wrote it.”

Eren looked at him, his expression now more placid, maybe a bit curious, “So, you’re the one that found me? And fixed me up?”

“Yeah,” the blonde looked down at the book in his lap and closed it, putting it with the notebook.

Eren had so many questions, and a lot to say, but his brain settled for, “What made you do it?” Nice, not even a thank you.

He glanced up, shrugging his shoulders once, “I don’t know. You were caught in a fence, on my dad’s neighbor’s property. I know the guy, and trust me-he would not have been too hospitable if he found you on his land the next morning.”

Eren looked at his hands, “Oh. Thanks. I probably would’ve died if you hadn’t did that.”

“Yeah, you’re welcome,” the man replied.

“I know that I definitely owe you my life and I am so grateful and stuff, but I still need help,” Eren said, reaching to scratch the back of his neck, “That change was bad, but the others haven’t been any better. I have no idea how to do this whole werewolf thing, and I don’t know anyone who does. Do you think you could, I don’t know, just tell me how to be _better_ and not nearly die every full moon?”

The blonde’s eyes widened a bit, “Oh, uh, I don’t-I don’t really know much, I think you have the wrong idea. I’m not a werewolf.”

“Oh? Oh,” Eren furrowed his brows, “But you know more than me. Could you at least help me with what you do know? I know you have no obligation to help me, and you already did once, but I just-learning on my own hasn’t gone well at all. I keep making my sister miss work and school because I’m too dumb to take care of myself for one night a month.”

The other man scratched his temple, “I…I have some books on lycanthropy.” He pulled the notebook out from under his text book, and ripped a page out of it, using his pencil to write something down, “I’m Armin, by the way. Here’s my address, okay? I’ll try to help you, but just. Yeah. I’m free on the weekends, I guess, starting at around seven.”

Eren grabbed the note when he offered it, the same lovely script as the one he found in his sweatpants pocket, “Thank you so much, dude-Armin. Thanks. I’m Eren, and I will-I will definitely be there, okay?”

Armin nodded, picking up the text book, “Just don’t expect there to be snacks.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> the next chapters gonna be leading into reibert just fyi this story isn't all about werewolf eren and vamp arm dont worry B)


	3. Reiner's bad decisions and Armin's hot friend

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Reiner hasn't ever been the best at thinking with the head on his shoulders, but sometimes he does things even he finds embarrassingly un-thought-out.

Reiner didn’t exactly have the _greatest_ thought process. At best it could be pretty flawed, but this had been harebrained, even for him. Armin had been the person that really convinced him to go through with this plan, but now Reiner realized that he hadn’t even listened to what Armin said about colleges these days.

It hadn’t seemed that bad, for the first few weeks. He’d been determined to go through with it, and so he had. At the time all he saw were pros. A college degree got you a better job-a better job meant more money right? And more money meant more opportunities to get with a cute passerby. Colleges were crawling with people, some young and some ancient, some hard to get and some desperate, some straight and some gay and some a cozy in-between. It was like Reiner’s favorite type of environment, he thrived in it, and could always find someone to take home. He could take later classes so he could sleep in, go for an easy degree, be a better person for it in four years.

Except he hadn’t actually considered the schoolwork, and was sort of drowning because he had procrastinated everything for the past two weeks.

He was pissed at himself honestly, and wished he could go back in time to kick his own ass. He was stalking up and down the aisles of the library, looking for reference material on Malaysian mythology and its influence in today’s culture. He didn’t have the attention span for this.

His nails were getting longer, he noticed as he trailed them over the spines of different encyclopedias. They were naturally black, but the small cartoony skulls in white nail polish were his own doing. He tapped them in an easy rhythm, and only when he got to the end of the aisle did he realize he hadn’t looked at the rest of the books.

Reiner wasn’t used to this. Since school started, he’d actually been sleeping. He hadn’t actually slept in years, because he didn’t need the extra energy. He was an incubus, he lived on sex, why would he need to sleep, aside from a catnap here and there? He wasn’t used to being in a dry spell-incubuses don’t _have_ dry spells. He could literally feel how tired he was, like he wasn’t sated in the least. He hated college.

He sighed, reaching up to scratch just behind his horns, and backtracked. Malaysian mythology. Just find the M book, Reiner, you _got_ this.

Eventually he grabbed one book, and started to walk down the other aisles. Maybe look under the M titles. Both his key words started with M.

“Do you need some help?” a soft voice asked, and Reiner had to turn and look down as a small woman gave him a small smile, “I’m volunteering here today, and you look confused.”

Reiner quickly eyed her up and down. She was petite, with thin blonde hair hanging just below her shoulders. With big blue eyes, and a small nose, she was absolutely adorable. She was wearing a longer skirt, pleated and a dark blue, with a bright green sweater and nice little white boots.

Reiner smiled in turn, “I would love some help, especially from someone as cute as you.”

She didn’t really respond to the last part, “What are you looking for today?”

“Um, anything of Malaysian mythology? And it’s influence today, or something.”

The small blonde nodded, “I can help you find some great articles on that. Can I ask why you’re looking at Potions and herbs?”

Reiner looked at the books in front of him, “Oh. Well, I just went to the ‘M’ section.”

The blonde laughed a little, “Oh, no, books are organized by author’s last name. That’s pretty much universal, at least in this country.”

Reiner got a little embarrassed. Not knowing something the girl was writing off as common knowledge made him feel pretty dumb, “Well, if I’m honest I haven’t been in a library in a long time. A very, very long time.”

“That’s okay, I’m here to help,” the blonde turned on her heel, and Reiner followed her, after a second of awkward debate. She led him around, plucking books off of shelves like she knew exactly which books were where and the contents of each. She handed them off to Reiner as she picked them, and didn’t really give any answers to the questions he asked. He was getting pretty frustrated with himself, because if he was so tired his charms and aura weren’t working…well that was just a huge flaw in the way incubuses worked.

He let her check out the books for him, telling her over the counter, “I’m Reiner, by the way. I haven’t seen you on campus before.”

She smiled, “Well, that is probably because thousands of students go to this university. But I’m Krista.”

“Thank you for helping me out, I was really lost,” Reiner gave her a trademark smile, “I was wondering, are you busy this weekend?”

Krista nodded, “Yes, I am!”

“That’s cool,” Reiner said, crossing his arms over the counter, “What are you planning on doing?”

She blinked, and her irises swallowed the rest of her eye’s color, making her pupils and sclera completely sky blue. She grinned, almost impossibly wide, her teeth suddenly sharp and serrated. Reiner felt his eyebrows furrow, mouth slightly part with the surprise of the transformation. Was he really that drained, he couldn’t even detect a simple glamour?

“I’m busy being uninterested,” she said, her voice still just as sweet as she handed the books over to him.

He nodded vaguely, turning around and nearly walking straight into another woman. He made an embarrassing noise, jumping back and hitting himself on the counter. The woman in front of him grinned, “Is this guy giving you trouble, babe?”

Behind him Krista said, “No, we were sharing weekend plans.”

The woman in front of him leaned closer to him, and Reiner got serious bad vibes. She had dark olive skin, dotted with freckles across her cheeks, her eyes dark and sort of unsettling. She was shorter than Reiner, but it still seemed like she was looking down at him.

Reiner didn’t understand what was going on, and was confused and scared.

“I’m Krista’s girlfriend,” the woman said, “And we’d both appreciate it if you didn’t use your pitiful charms on her. Lord knows they only work on humans and weaker hybrids.”

Reiner opened his mouth, his mind a little scrambled, “Uh, okay. Sorry, I didn’t mean to bother you.”

He sidestepped around the woman, but stumbled a little when she disappeared into wispy black smoke, appearing behind the counter with her arms on Krista’s shoulders from behind the smaller woman.

“Bye, Reiner,” Krista called, and the other woman added, “Yeah. Bye, Reiner,” though she sounded a lot less friendly.

Reiner waved, and rubbing the side of his face as he walked out of the library. He followed a small flow of other students outside, and was able to spot his friends sitting at a picnic table. Jean had his face buried in Marco’s neck, and Marco was laughing and had his arms around his boyfriend’s shoulders, but Reiner decided to interrupt anyway because this was a public place and even an incubus knew PDA could only be tolerated so much. But maybe that was his bad mood.

He dropped the stack of books on the table, the loud sound startling them both and they jumped apart.

“You scared us, Reiner,” Marco said, a blush across his freckled cheeks.

Jean made a scoffing sound, “What’s got your horns so twisted. You look pissed.”

Reiner rubbed both hands up and down his face, “I am so, so tired. I haven’t been able to think straight in four weeks. Some girls in the library just scared the fuck outta me, and I’m _hungry_ , and I feel like shit.”

“Oh, Krista and Ymir?” Marco said, “How’d they scare you? Ymir can be pretty sarcastic, but she’s alright. And Krista is so lovely!”

Reiner glared at him, “Yeah, okay. I tried flirting with Krista and she dropped the glamour and it surprised me, and then the other one just fucking appeared behind me, and I just, I got freaked out. I don’t know.”

Marco made a sympathetic noise, “Yeah, they’re pretty close. They are nice, though, you guys just got off on the wrong foot.” He took a sip from his Starbucks drink that Reiner knew had been long and complicated order and was filled with sugar. He kind of wanted to throw it away just because he was feeling nasty.

“Why do you feel so bad, didn’t you get laid like, last weekend?” Jean asked, propping his head on his hands.

Reiner made a slightly disgusted face at him, “Jean, see how fucking happy you are if you go without fucking sleeping for a week. Or try not eating for six days. See how great you feel. I _implore_ you.”

Jean pursed his lips, “Well. Why don’t you go out and pick someone up.”

“I _can’t_ ,” Reiner seethed, “I have so much work backlogged from where I put off school to get _laid_ , do you see my goddamn problem?”

Reiner felt like punching Jean in the face. But he was just having a bad day.

“Well, I mean, I’m sure you could find somebody for a quickie,” Jean said, shrugging. Scratch that, Reiner wanted to punch him because he was a complete ass.

Reiner settled for running a hand through his short hair, down the center to avoid his horns.

“Unless you’re losing your touch, Reiner,” he could literally hear the smug tone in Jean’s voice.

He looked up at the asshole, who was smirking at him, “Jean, I could fuck you so hard your eyes would change color.”

“He’s a shapeshifter,” Marco said, “That’s not that hard to do. Pretty easy, actually.”

Jean’s cheeks got red, and he made a face at his boyfriend. Reiner snorted, “Is that why your eyes will be purple or something for like two days? That happens every like week.”

“No,” Jean snapped, his face redder.

“Hah,” Reiner laughed, “I didn’t think you were a top, Marco.”

Marco shrugged, even though Jean looked like he was about to combust. Marco looked at him out of the corner of his eye, drinking from his starbucks cup.

“You look like you’re about to turn into a budgie and fly away,” Reiner commented, looking down at his stack of books and making an annoyed hum, “Marco, I will pay you a hundred dollars to do my paper.”

Marco just laughed, and Reiner sighed. Marco was too angelic to cheat like that, plus he would be fretting over getting expelled for the rest of the semester. Jean would do it, but Jean wasn’t exactly the sharpest tool in the shed.

“Where’s Armin?” Reiner asked, more asking to get his mind off the workload. Armin damned sure wouldn’t do his work.

“He’s talking to his friend, who just transferred here or something,” Marco said, opening his own textbook, “He’s over by the fountain.”

Reiner looked to his right, looking over the people around the fountain before he spotted his shorter undead friend nearer to the table than he thought. Armin had a different umbrella today, a dark gray one with white swirls, and was wearing a high-waisted gray pleated skirt. He also had on black tights with his converse, and a loose purple shirt, plus his cute little white gloves.

“Armin totally owns having to cover every inch of his goddamn skin in the sun, you know?” Reiner told the other two.

Marco made a noise of agreement, “He looks cute as hell today.” Reiner ignored the noise of protest from Jean and the gross coddling that followed it.

Reiner was too busy checking out Armin’s new friend anyway. He was tall, over a foot taller than Armin. He had sort of nervous posture, which Reiner only knew because it sort of helped him with his incubus shenanigans, but that was a different story. The friend’s hair was black and shiny, and Reiner found himself wanting to touch it just to see if it was as soft as it looked.

“Fuck, Armin’s friend is hot,” Reiner said, but was talking to a brick wall because Jean and Marco were back to nuzzling each other.

Armin pointed to the table Reiner was sitting at, and Reiner waved. Armin waved back, but the friend just started to rub one of his arms sort of awkwardly. Reiner grinned when he realized Armin was leading him to the table.

As he got closer, Reiner could see him _so_ much better. His skin was dark and the kind of clear you assume only photoshop can provide. He had the book definition of doe eyes, dark and sweet and they looked ready to fucking sparkle (Reiner had taken several dicks at once and never said anything that gay, but damned if it wasn’t true.) He had high cheek bones, a well-defined jaw line, and lips that had a nice cupid’s bow and looked so very soft.

“Guys, this is Bertholdt,” Armin said, even using a small gesture to clarify it was, indeed, the man standing beside him.

Bertholdt. Reiner could learn to say that name in all the best ways.

Jean’s head was leaned on Marco’s shoulder, “Hey, Bertholdt, I’m Jean.”

“I’m Marco,” the nymph smiled at the new guy, and Bertholdt himself smiled in return, the gesture slightly hesitant. It was the prettiest, cutest smile Reiner had even seen.

Reiner himself stood up, holding out a hand, “I’m Reiner.”

Bertholdt was standing still but it still seemed like he tripped over himself to extend his own hand. His palms were kind of sweaty, but his fingers were long with clean fingernails and a firm grip. Hands were important to Reiner, not that he was in any condition to be picky, but still-you could do a lot with hands, it’s best they be attractive, too.

“Hi,” Bertholdt’s voice was deep, but it came out as a squeak. Reiner smiled wider, that was positively endearing. Reiner could nearly literally eat someone like this up.

“Guys, I’m going to be showing Bert around campus for the next week or so,” Armin told them, “I’m going to show him to his next class, but I wanted you guys to meet him.”

“What’s your next class?” Reiner asked.

Bert looked like he hadn’t expected anyone to ask him a question, “Uh, Psychology.”

“Oh, I know where that is,” Reiner did not know where that was, “I could show him instead, Armin.”

Armin smiled, patting his friend on the shoulder, “That’s okay, we we’re going to make some other stops, too. But we’ll see you guys later, okay?”

Reiner waved as they left, watching the poster child of the tagline ‘tall, dark, and handsome’ walk away.

He turned back to his friends, announcing in the determine way he had, “I am going to fuck that.”

“I could tell you were trying,” Jean said, “You’re so thirsty.”

Jean loved that joke, and it had been funny, maybe the first six times. Reiner needed sex like water, it did have a certain humor to it, but hearing it sixty times had worn it the fuck out.

“I don’t think I’m the only one, judging by how your hands been on Marco’s inner thigh for the past three minutes,” Reiner said, popping his shoulder just for dramatic emphasis. The look on Jean’s face was absolutely priceless.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hell yea hell ya thank u all for the comments and the kudos :*  
> next chapter is a Ymir chapter \m/  
> [my tumblr](420fubar.tumblr.com)


	4. Ymir Shenanigans

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ymir's a demon, it's basically her job to fuck shit up whenever possible

Ymir got bored pretty easy. Heaven had gotten boring in two centuries, though Hell had preoccupied her for about six. Rebelling had been a nice breath of fresh air, and just figuring out the twentieth and twenty-first centuries was enough to keep her hooked. The world was always changing and evolving-Russia wasn’t a vampiric dictatorship anymore, there was therapy for demigods with urges to kill various inhuman creatures, there was a whole fashion market directed at people with four arms. Humans were actually well-integrated today, as opposed to them usually being on the menu when Ymir fell from heaven. It was an entire new world to explore, and Ymir loved it.

But Ymir decidedly did _not_ like the library Krista had chosen to volunteer at. Yes, Krista needed to volunteer for her scholarship, but couldn’t she volunteer somewhere _less boring_?

There was nothing to do in the library. She couldn’t talk very loud, and disturbing students reading or studying was absolutely not allowed. Krista told her to read a book, but Ymir had read everything she’d cared to read of the century as far as she was concerned. She would’ve mixed up the books but that would’ve just made more work for Krista, which meant less time for Ymir.

Ymir groaned to herself, collapsing against the counter as Krista stamped the back of a book for some nerd. This library was stuffy and dark and the silence was so forced and Ymir really hated uncomfortable quietness.

“You don’t have to stay with me, you know,” Krista said softly, placing a small hand on Ymir’s shoulder. Ymir hummed in reply, looking around the huge library. Ymir didn’t really like leaving Krista, because the blonde was the only one she really liked on campus. Hell, she didn’t even go to college here, she just sort of came because Krista did.

Ymir sat down in the desk chair behind the counter, looking at all the return books Krista had to go through. The first day she’d made them disappear somewhere but Krista had freaked out about having to pay for them out of pocket so she’d had to miracle them back. Library work was tedious and boring.

Ymir wasn’t even the one working, and she was pretty sure that made it worse.

She tapped her feet against the floor, putting her arms against the back of the chair. Krista was off helping some other idiot with finding a book. There were computers for that, but Ymir didn’t say anything. At least none of them were like that stupid incubus that’d come in the other day. He’d looked so bad that if he hadn’t tried to hit on Krista, Ymir probably would’ve been a bit concerned.

She let herself lean on the counter, putting her head on her crossed arms. Just a few more hours, what was that to a demon that had lived for hundreds of years? An annoyance, a speck in hindsight. Ymir looked around, seeing a satyr swaying on their furry little goat legs trying to reach a book on a shelf too high for them. She sighed. It was still going to be a long few hours.

At some point she must have fallen asleep on her arms, because she woke up with a strangely high-pitched static noise in the back of her brain.

She sat up, standing as well, as she was sure she heard it. Krista was back beside her, and looked her way. The smaller woman’s expression was obviously confused, but it took Ymir a moment to place what the sound meant.

She kindly referred to it as her demon radar, of sorts. But it also picked up other unholy or heavenly beings. And it was definitely picking something up.

That was weird, as most demons on the surface weren’t _actual_ demons. Maybe a human that’d been put under a curse, a hybrid with demon blood, someone who’d sold their soul, something like that. Running into another demon was frankly rare and terrifying.

She didn’t think this was a demon, though. The other possibility was exceedingly rare and terrifying.

Krista asked in a hushed tone where she was going when she teleported past the counter. Ymir shrugged, pre-occupied with the buzzing in her brain, “Spidey senses are tingling.”

She walked out of the library, sort of wary, but more curious than anything. Ymir hadn’t gotten out of hell because she was a pansy, after all.

She stuffed her hands into the pockets of her pants, walking down the hall where just a few other students loitered about. She moved around them when necessary, using the volume of the static in her head to play a game of hot-or-cold with where this other guy was.

It took her a minute to place him. He was walking with a small vampire, but he was anything but small. Maybe six foot three, with wide shoulders. He had black hair, and the same skin tone she did. Except the air around him was…angelic.

He wasn’t an angel, she could tell. Not fully, anyway. He didn’t seem to be aware she was trailing him, but she grinned because the increase in his fidgeting was most definitely because of her. He was probably mainly angel, enough to send off the bells in her head. Her grin widened as she thought of everything she could do to screw with this guy.

The small vampire she was nearly sure was named Armin. He was pretty popular around campus. So the angel and the leech were friends.

She listened closer to their conversation, picking up the angel’s name was Bert, or some variation thereof. Bert the angel, how…vapid. She saw him look around, and saw sweat glistening on his forehead. Maybe she gave off more bad vibes than she gave herself credit for.

She walked behind another student, one with quite an impressive rack. The antlers also made it pretty easy to hide. Ymir gathered angel boy was new to the university, and the bloodsucker was helping him around campus.

She wondered if he saw her would he realize what she was, or would it take more than that. She tried to maneuver around a column in a wide intersection when she ran into someone else.

“What the fuck, watch it,” she grumbled rubbing the side of her head. She looked up, and there was the incubus from the other day, Reindeer or some shit.

He furrowed his eyebrows at her, not gracing her with an apology, and looked back around the column.

“Are you hiding from somebody?” she asked, crossing her arms. Armin had stopped and was explaining something to angel boy, pointing down each hallway. There were too many other students around to hear what he was saying.

The incubus snorted, and Ymir noted he looked just that much shittier than the day before, “No.” She followed his line of sight, and if she was not mistaken, he was looking at the angel.

“Have you got your shitty fuck-target aimed at the cherub?” she asked, the disdain in her voice obvious, “Good luck, those sonsa bitches are so self-righteous it makes me sick.”

Reindeer looked at her, “Have you seen this guy? I don’t care if he’s the most uppity bastard this side of the Pacific, I’m getting some of that.”

“Are you in any condition to be scoping out challenges? Jesus, it looks like you’d be willing to pick up a five dollar whore by this point.”

The incubus sneered back, “I have standards, you know. Very low standards. Okay, maybe no standards, but I have some fucking pride. Why are you even talking to me, anyway?”

“I don’t even know, I’m bored,” Ymir answered, “Or else there’s no way I’d risk my brain cells with this conversation.”

He made a face at her, and she continued, “Don’t you know the little blonde out there? Why can’t you get him to introduce you?”

“He already has,” Reindeer responded.

Ymir furrowed her brows, “Then why are sneaking around like a creep? Oh, I forgot, you are a creep.”

“You don’t even know me,” he snapped, “And I’m not sneaking around…I just…just shut up I’ve been doing this a long time.”

“What? Being a creep?” Ymir said, “Must be a better creep than incubus, because you look like you haven’t gotten a bit of ass in a month.”

“Two weeks and four days, thanks,” the bigger blonde turned away, and Ymir followed. He was pretty easy to bother, too, and if he was following angel boy, she could follow him and be a hindrance to both of them.

“Wow, that is a long time,” Ymir said, “Have you taken to passing out yet?”

Reiner didn’t look over his shoulder as he answered, “No, don’t fucking jinx me. I’ve been sleeping all night and drinking coffee like it’s going out of style. I hate coffee.”

“I asked for a simple answer, not a progress report on your problems. Also, who doesn’t like coffee, what the fuck, dude,” Ymir put her hands back in her pockets, walking with him. She looked him up and down, with his dark under eye circles and rather un-put-together appearance. Like most college students. She had to admit his horns were really cool, curling once before sticking slightly upwards, out beside his temples. She’d always been sort of jealous she didn’t get horns when she fell. That seemed like false advertising.

“Coffee’s gross,” Reindeer said, “It’s bitter and no matter how much sugar or creamer you put in it, it still sucks.”

Ymir scoffed, “You probably just suck at making it. You might just be putting too much sugar in it. Too sweet is worse than too bitter.”

“That explains your personality.”

She smiled without humor at him, “ha-ha, so funny, at least I’m not the one that looks like they’ve been slam-dunked into a dumpster.”

“I’d tell you to suck my dick, but I’m not even going to joke about that nightmare.”

Ymir barked a laugh, turning with him as Armin started to show Bert the rec rooms. They followed them in, arguing with each other until Armin noticed them and waved the incubus over, and Ymir went with him.

The expression on the angel’s face was priceless as she walked up to him.

Armin smiled under the large brim of his floppy sunhat, “Hey, Reiner, and…Ymir, right?”

Ymir nodded, smiling widely at the anxious and nervous expression the angel boy was giving her, “I was just about to challenge Reiner here to a game of pool.”

Reiner glanced her out of the corner of his eyes, “Yeah, but we have the time to talk for a minute.”

Armin gave them another sweet smile, “Oh, cool. Reiner, you know Bertl, but Bertl, this is Ymir, and Ymir this is Bertholdt.”

The much taller man didn’t say anything, but Ymir cheerily held out her hand, “Hi, Bertl.”

He nearly reluctantly held out his hand, like she would burn him. The idea wasn’t completely ridiculous, but she grabbed his palm anyway, firmly shaking his hand. She saw him visibly swallow, and smiled smugly.

“Are ya new here, Bertl?” Ymir asked, leaning closer. She actually saw a bead of sweat rolling down his temple.

He nodded quickly, “I transferred from, uh, West Maria.”

Ymir raised her eyebrows, “Oh, nice school.”

Bert smiled, none too relaxed about it, “Yeah, it was nice. I just, uh, think Sina’s nicer. And it has a lot more diversity, and uh, options.”

Ymir nodded slowly, “Cool. Cool. It’s understandable. Did many people from WM know you were an angel? Was that a hard thing to explain?”

The taller male’s smile wavered, and he reached up to rub the back of his neck, “Actually, uh, not many people noticed it. I was brought up in a big city, with my human parent. I’m only half-angel. It’s not that big of a deal.”

“Oh, of course it is,” Ymir scoffed, keeping up her grin and crossing her arms, “It’s always a big deal. Where’re your wings? Every angel I’ve ever met has been real quick to show them off.”

His smile fell, the expression replaced with something Ymir couldn’t exactly describe but was satisfying nonetheless.

“Ymir, let’s play that pool game now,” Reiner said, his voice practically a growl.

Ymir turned to him, smiling slyly, “Sure, sure. You rack ‘em, I’ll break.”

She waved to Bertl and Armin, both looking at least a little uncomfortable as she followed the meathead to the pool tables across the room.

“Why the hell’d you do that?” Reiner hissed.

Ymir laughed, “Because it’s _fun_.”

“You were making him so uncomfortable,” he scoffed, “He’s new here, goddamn, can’t you pull back on being an asshole.”

“One, no I can’t, and I won’t. Two, if I had a dime for every time an angel has talked down to me, I’d have a stack high enough to reach to heaven. Don’t talk to me about being an asshole,” Ymir said, “Make sure you rack them tight, I want a good break.”

Reiner made a face at her, but started to put the pool balls in the triangle. Ymir swirled her hand in the air, her favorite pool stick appearing in her hand. Reiner made a face, stating, “That’s hardly fair.”

She shrugged, picking up a square of chalk, “You gonna cry about it?”

He, sadly, did not cry. He just picked up one of the pool sticks on the wall and watched her break them up. The game didn’t last long because apparently, the incubus sucked at pool. She absolutely killed him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> next chapter is springles prepare urselves
> 
> and hugs and kisses x10000 to all people who leave comments or kudos or even bother to read!! ily!!
> 
> also changed tumblr urls now im funkyjosuke if ur interested lmao


	5. Sasha's homework destroys her apartment

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Being a witchcraft student has it's perks and disadvantages. Homework becoming sentient is definitely a con, but hey, at least it didn't eat her underwear.

Sasha’s morning was going great. She was already running late, her homework had become sentient sometime in the night and had destroyed the living room, Connie had caught the cabinets in the kitchen on fire again, and she’d frozen them solid in a panic. They were still melting, forcing her and her boyfriend to eat cereal off a napkin while drinking milk from a jug since the cabinets were stubbornly frozen shut with magic she couldn’t undo within the hour.

“I don’t understand how you managed to catch the cabinets on fire again,” Sasha said.

“I thought you made them fire-resistant,” Connie countered, “I figured leaving for a moment or two wouldn’t have mattered.”

She looked at him, her mouth parted a little, “You just left the stove on while you did gods know what? I made them fire-resistant, not stupidity-proof.”

Connie shrugged, throwing more of the fruity cereal in his mouth.

Sasha looked at the living room over his shoulder, the couch on its side against the wall, the coffee table broken, and pillow fluff everywhere.

Connie saw her looking and smirked, “It wasn’t just me that did something stupid in the past 12 hours.”

She narrowed her eyes, “Oh, hush. I was sure I put a spell lock on the cage.”

“It was a high-level essay,” Connie shrugged, “You shouldn’t be surprised it got out.”

Sasha tilted her head in general agreement, “Hurry up and eat your cereal, it took forever to catch all the pages.”

“I can’t believe it turned the couch over,” Connie murmured, stuffing the cereal bag back in the box as Sasha made the milk put itself in the fridge. The kobalos hadn’t grown up around magic, but since meeting Sasha, it’d nearly become completely normal to him.

“Me neither,” Sasha said, “I hope that doesn’t mean it was too wordy. I really want to make a good grade on this.”

“Can you get my bag with yours?” Connie asked, and Sasha nodded, flicking her finger and making Connie’s bookbag hit him heavily in the chest. She snapped, and found herself fully dressed, and even though she couldn’t see herself she hoped her hair and makeup were in order.

She shouldered her bag, and picked up her essay again, in its little bird-like cage, “Do you think I’ll get points deducted for not stapling it?”

“I have no idea,” Connie admitted, “I’m majoring in mechanics, not witchcraft. I assume your professors are going to be a bit more lenient with, ah, problems like this one.”

Sasha nodded, opening their front door. Sadly, their neighbor was taking the trash out of their own condo. The old woman was crotchety at best, and waved her cane at them, cursing loudly about kids these days and how they kept her up all night flipping furniture.

“I’m sorry, Mrs. Bea,” Sasha said, “It was just my homework, I messed up the incantations for it-“

“Bah,” the old woman waved her off, hobbling away. Sasha watched her go, mouth still open and hand still up as if she was mid-explanation until Connie finished manually locking the door and pushed her towards the piece of shit car they co-owned.

Sasha murmured about changing the old woman’s cane into a cobra, just once for a laugh, and Connie chided her because if she died of a heart attack they’d do jail time. Sasha frowned, looking at the chipped red paint on the old model car, and smacked the hood. The charm spread slowly, and suddenly there was an incredibly shiny mustang in their car’s usual spot.

“Wow,” Connie whistled low, “You’re using up a lot of magic this morning.”

“Fuck it,” Sasha said, “I’ve had a tough one.”

Connie shrugged, agreeing, as he got into the passenger seat. Sasha sat behind the wheel, shoving her book bag at Connie and revving the engine. They got out of the driveway, and were off to University, ten minutes late and hell bent to get there on time anyway.

Sasha was a notoriously reckless driver when she went fast, and it showed as she skidded into the parking lot. She parked, and grabbed her bag out of Connie’s lap, about to dash out of the car.

“Wait, you’re forgetting something!” Connie called, and she sat back down, looking in the floorboard.

“What, what is it?” she asked, before he cupped her chin and kissed her very chastely, eyes closed and lips puckered more than necessary.

She smiled, patting his head, “Have a good day working on whatever it is mechanic engineers do.”

“And you have a good day working on whatever it is witches do, try not to burn your eyebrows off again,” he said, back, opening the car door and quite literally running towards his building. Sina was a huge school, and the more mundane buildings of education tended to be farther away. Which didn’t make much sense, because Sasha could just transport herself in front of her classroom but since the building was so close, it was smarter to just walk and save stamina.

As she was quick-stepping down the stairwell, trying to make it to her first class on time, she heard a “Hey, wait, Sasha!”

She turned around, seeing Jean practically jump down the steps, clutching a small semi-opaque tubberware container to his chest.

“I see you have your essay,” Jean said.

“I see you have yours,” Sasha responded, starting to hurry down the steps again, “Did everyone’s become sentient, you think?”

“I don’t know,” Jean told her, taking the steps two at a time, “Did yours eat your underwear?”

“What?” Sasha asked, “No, mine destroyed the living room. Yours ate your underwear?”

“Yeah,” Jean said with a sort-of laugh, “Every single pair of my boxers. Marco woke me up at two in the morning about to have a heart attack because something was messing with the dresser.”

“Oh god.”

“Long story short, I got up ready to kick ass just to find sixteen pages of my essay was chomping on my favorite pair of boxers. And they only ate mine, Marco has every pair of his completely intact. And now the pages are also mostly plaid.”

“Are you _serious_ ,” Sasha laughed, turning with him down the hall as the building started to smell more herbal, “Oh my god.”

“I’m hoping teach will let us have out papers back,” Jean said, “And hopefully I can coerce my fucking underwear out of the pages.”

“The struggle is so real,” Sasha said, “Mine apparently kept my elderly neighbor up all night, which I don’t doubt because it broke the coffee table and turned the couch on its side, and destroyed every pillow that Connie’s mother so thoughtfully embroidered for us.”

“Oh, what,” Jean sounded disappointed, “You guys don’t have the penis joke pillows anymore?”

“Nope,” Sasha confirmed, “Ripped to bits, pillow fluff everywhere.”

“Lame,” Jean huffed, “Sucks about the living room.”

“Sucks about the underwear,” Sasha said, “Are you just wearing the same undies you slept in? Or did Marco let you borrow some?”

Jean raised an eyebrow, opening the door to the lecture room, “Like I sleep in underwear. And Marco’s underwear is too big for me.”

Sasha followed him in, “Figures, Marco has a big ass. And you do not.”

“Why are you even looking at our asses?”

“Because,” Sasha said shortly, following Jean to a pair of seats quickly, evaluating how everyone else’s essay seemed to also be contained in some way. One person had a steak knife stabbed through theirs, which probably had an interesting story behind it, “So, what, are you just going commando today?”

Jean shrugged, sitting down first and putting his bag on top of his essay.

“Risqué,” Sasha commented, sitting down beside him.

He tapped the cage she had on her desk, “This thing looks old. You really went for the orthodox witch look, huh?”

“Yeah, I think it was my mom’s,” Sasha said, narrowing her eyes at the papers stuffed hastily in a cage, “Where’s the professor?”

It took a while for the professor to come in the classroom, tucking her hair behind her ears as she asked everyone to sit down. Her teaching materials floated slowly to her desk behind her, and she scolded a dry erase marker when it tried to write something on the white board.

“Good morning, class,” Ms. Ral said, tucking a piece of auburn hair behind her ear. Her hair was sort of disheveled, like she hadn’t brushed it this morning, “Sorry I’m late, the broom wouldn’t start this morning. That was a lame joke, forgive me.”

Jean leaned back in his chair, and Sasha saw him cross his eyes. She snickered a little.

“Well, if you guys could all pass your essays up front-“ Ms. Ral stopped, a student closer to the front telling her something that Sasha couldn’t hear. It probably went along the lines of ‘my paper came to life and fucked up my shit last night.’

“Oh,” Ms. Ral’s eyebrows rose, “Well, that was to be expected from essays on the controversy of powerful spells. I know a few of you had papers bordering on the morality of necromancy. And you all didn’t use charmed binders to hold your papers together? Oh my. I hope it wasn’t too much of a problem for you all, because theyre still due today.”

A couple student groaned, and the professor directed them to pass their essays forward. The stacks that accumulated in the front of the room were very interesting-Sasha’s bird cage was on top of a shoebox taped around multiple times with blue painter’s tape.

“Well, now that that’s done,” the professor gave a small laugh as she made all the essays disappear-probably to her car or office, or something of that sort. Petra Ral was such a good witch it wouldn’t have been surprising if she’d made them appear in her own house, miles away.

Jean almost immediately fell asleep when the power point came on screen. Sasha swore to herself she would not let him copy her notes after class, since he’s the one that chose to sleep through them. Plus it was unlikely Jean would remember to make himself copy them down. Which he always did and regretted later.

Sasha at least had the decency to wake him up after the professor dismissed them. He rubbed his eyes, the gold color bright even though he just woke up. He sniffed, rubbing his face before standing to collect his stuff.

“I’ll see you soon, then,” Sasha said, smacking him on the shoulder. He nodded, still packing his things as she left to go down the hall. She wandered down the hall, following someone with a really dirty backpack down another hallway to her physics class, which explored the different theories of physics in magic and different ways to set up your spell so as to not bend any big rules and consequently deplete your energy for casting. It was Sasha’s most boring class, but a mandatory one for her degree. It sucked.

She tried her best to keep up, she did, but forty minutes in she gave up. It was much easier to think about where to go for lunch.

Sasha had been positive going to college for witchcraft wouldn’t be so _boring_.

She honestly felt bad for people going for more mundane degrees. Discussing the difference between formulating your charm with an anti-gravity base over adding it in later was boring her out of her mind. Who cared how you got the spell to work as long as it did?

After another fifty minutes, she had started counting how many students had on a certain color shirt. Over 75% had on black, around a half dozen or so were wearing plaid. She looked down at her t-shirt with a burger on it, trying to wonder what it said about her vs her classmates. But as soon as the professor dismissed her, she didn’t care anyway.  She was headed towards the big oak tree behind the witchcraft division, since it was where Connie always waited for her.

Today was really no different, as he was still under the huge tree’s shade, only Reiner was with him, and they were both intently focused on a handshake that seemed to have no actual purpose. It was like they were just finding different ways to tap their fists together.

“What are you numnuts doing?” She asked, sitting down in the grass and leaning back against the tree and its roots.

Connie looked her way, and Reiner nearly automatically bopped him on the nose, snorting with laughter. The incubus sat down beside Sasha, still grinning, “Hello, Ms. Braus.”

“Hello, Mr. Braun,” Sasha replied, “Are you joining us for lunch?”

“Dunno,” Reiner leaned back on his palms, “I was thinking of asking angel boy for his number today.

Connie shrugged, pulling on a sharply pointed ear in thought, “I was kind of thinking Mexican.”

“Mexican does sound good,” Sasha thought, rubbing her belly, “Or pizza.”

“You guys are ignoring my romantic woes,” Reiner commented dryly, “This is serious.”

Connie sniffed, putting one hand in his pocket, “Well, you look better than you have in a few weeks. I figured it was that you’d gotten laid.”

Sasha tuned out the conversation, pulling out her phone as Reiner said something and sending her tutor a message.

**Can you help w/ spell functions?**

“I was desperate, I hate doing that kind of shit,” Reiner was saying, “I mean, I’m all for helping someone explore their sexuality, but a single blowjob to never be returned, in the little shower stall? That’s not my style. It’s someone’s style, but not mine.”

Connie pursed his lips, “So, are you going out to eat with us, or no?”

Sasha looked down as her phone vibrated in her hand, opening the message and reading it.

**Ofc I can duh can I come on campus**

**Can I meet your friends**

**Can I meet your professor**

Sasha typed out a negative reply, relaying the fact that she and Connie were going to get lunch and that she didn’t have any more classes with Ms. Ral today. Her tutor sent back a series of sad emojis, along with one dragon. Sasha wasn’t sure what the dragon was supposed to mean.

“Don’t fuck the angel,” Connie was saying, as Reiner stood up, “Angels are friends, not food.”

“I’m going to fuck the angel,” Reiner said, dusting off his cargo shorts, “whether you guys will help me or not.”

Sasha watched him walk away, before Connie sat down next to her, “He’s a mess.”

“Yep,” Sasha agreed, “I wish him the best of luck in his endeavors.”

“Must be hard,” Connie sighed dramatically, “Not being able to get laid.”

“Oh, the troubles of being someone who is not Connie Springer,” Sasha added, placing her hand equally dramatically to her chest.

Connie grinned at her, standing up and helping her grab her books as he suggested a nearby Mexican joint. It was apparently owned by a Naga very fond of cheese, and that was something Sasha had very in common with him. She linked their arms together, walking in step with her shorter boyfriend all the way there.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this is so fuckign late lmao


	6. Jean takes petplay to another dimension

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jean and Marco have known each other so long that they kind of forget how weird they both are.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> (theres no petplay that was a joke)

Marco could be pretty sensitive. He assumed all nymphs were, though he hadn’t been around that many. None, to be exact. Most of them were too shy and reserved to leave the forests where they were born and raised. He was a bit of a special case there.

But he assumed how he could feel things emanating from plants and animals was a nymph thing. It seemed like it’d be a nymph thing. And it made him a little more susceptible to crying when a dog was hurt, or getting scared when a cat was too close to the road. He couldn’t help it.

This was really no different.

“Marco, come on,” Jean was taking on a begging tone, and they probably looked a little odd tugging on each other in the back of the garden center, “We can’t afford them all.”

“Jean, they’re so sad,” Marco insisted, holding up a small pot of aloe vera, “They need repotting, I think the succulents are getting too much water, and look, that bonsai is practically near death. Look, look at the leaves, Jean, please?”

“I’m sorry,” Jean held up his hands, “We don’t have enough money.”

Marco made a whining noise, putting down the aloe vera to pick up a small red-edged dracaena, “But, Jean.” He rubbed a browning leaf, feeling undeniably sad. What if no one bought it and took it home? What if they did and didn’t care for it? What if someone in the market was looking at it and dropped it and left it for other shoppers to step on and kill?

“Marco, please don’t cry,” Jean said, sounding just a small bit exasperated, “I’ll put the boxers back, and you can get a plant. A small one.”

“I want them all,” Marco murmured, looking over the small shelf of the plants less cared for.

“We can’t afford them all,” Jean said, looking sadly at a pack of boxers as he stuffed them behind a snake plant. He would’ve just stuffed them in his pants, but he knew the security harpies would probably run him out of town if he did that. He did not yet know how they were so good at their job.

Marco looked over each plant, picking up one and then the other. Jean tapped his fingers on their cart as Marco seemingly picked up every pot within arm’s reach at least once.

“Maaarcooo,” Jean whined, leaning on the car and rocking it slowly forward and back, “Come on, Marc. We have to get back. You left the kittens in the bathroom, remember?”

Marco looked at him, making a small noise of recognition as he looked over the plants again, and quickly picked up a small pot of English ivy. It looked a little worse for the wear, Jean could admit.

Marco held it with one hand as he followed Jean to the checkout. Their total came just below how much money they both had, which at least let them breathe a sigh of relief. Especially Marco, as he did not want to put the plant back.

He helped Jean put the groceries in the back of their small SUV, but put the ivy up front with them. Jean had already started the car when Marco leaned over and kissed him on the cheek, before leaning back in his seat to look at the plant.

“You’re a nerd,” Jean accused, backing out of their parking spot.

Marco hummed, lifting a vine and looking at the dirt in the pot. He was going to replant it when he got home. He didn’t know where he was going to put it yet, either. Maybe next to the ferns.

He helped Jean get the groceries in when they got to their house. It was down a slightly long driveway, with trees dotting the front yard but not enough to block the sunlight from Marco’s flowerbeds. He was quite proud of them.

He was even more proud of the inside, really. When they first moved in, Jean had tried to confine him to only a few plants, but at the end of the day, Marco was a nymph and all around happier when he had plenty of nature around him. And the easiest way to do that, was house plants.

But, of course, the kittens he’d found abandoned behind the shed weren’t going to be turned away. And there was at least five birdbaths and five birdhouses in the backyard. He liked keeping squirrel feeders out, too, since they got jealous. And the deer were welcome, too, as long as they didn’t eat the flowers. It’d been hard to reiterate that to them.

He heard Jean putting up the groceries in the kitchen as he put the ivy on the TV stand. It was close enough to the stairs leading up to their attic-Jean liked to call it a loft-that Marco sort of thought about wrapping it around the bannisters when it got healthy enough to do so.

Their house was pretty small, Marco guessed. There was four rooms down stairs, while their bedroom upstairs took up the attic space. It wasn’t a big living space, but more than enough for them.

Marco opened the door to their bathroom-it was pretty big, because even though their house wasn’t there were only four rooms downstairs. A small brown kitten ran out of the room, and Marco laughed to himself as he opened up the door all the way so the other three kittens could come out if they wanted to. A black one with a white nose was balanced on the edge of the bathtub, while the other two brown ones were laying in the cat’s bed beside the sink.

Marco kneeled down and petted them, smiling as he heard them purring.

He felt another rub up against his hip, but looked back at a fully grown cat, with a tan coat and brown paws.

“You’re so jealous,” Marco commented, smiling as he leaned back a little to scratch his ears.

The cat seemed to narrow golden eyes at him, meowing loudly and jumping onto the edge of the sink. He twitched a brown-tipped tail until Marco stood up, going to try and pet the black kitten. When he turned around with the cat in his arms, his boyfriend was sitting on the counter.

Jean held out an arm, scratching the kitten on top of the head, “They’re getting bigger.”

“Yeah,” Marco said, as the kitten meowed, “We should probably put ads up for adoption.”

“Wow, you’re going to let them go?” Jean scoffed, “Even after you named them all after your favorite caffeinated beverages?”

Marco frowned, hugging the black kitten closer to him, “Well, we have to. They’d do better if they didn’t have to be in a small house with three other cats. Plus Mocha keeps trying to eat my plants.”

Jean grinned, “How dare she. Is that the one that ran out?”

“Yeah,” Marco said, “Probably straight to the ferns.”

Jean shrugged his shoulders, dropping off the counter and easily changing into a cat-form, padding away with a small collar on the same color his shirt had been. That would probably have been weird, but Marco had known him since before he could do such things-and that was a long time ago.

He looked in the living room, at the house plants on every table near any windows, and the taller ones set beside the couch. A couple of hanging baskets were on either side of each doorway, and every windowsill was lined with even smaller plants. He looked at the kitten in his arm, one of many animals he’d brought inside the house to fix up or take care of. Jean must have gotten used to this just like he got used to Jean’s ability to change into whatever he wanted.

Still, not many people could say their boyfriend liked to be a cat and lay on the floor in patches of sunlight.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i am sorry this has been goin on so long i have had 0 motivation to do anything let alone write fanfiction for a fandom im not as absorbed in as i once was i apologize ive been too lazy to even upload this stockpile chapter sorrrrrrrrrry its not even that long lol


End file.
